Three gods: The hardest logic puzzle ever

* Required fields

* First name

* Last name

* Country

* Email address

* Password
Password must contain only letters and numbers, and be at least 8 characters

* Confirm password

Read More..

US stocks dip in absence of 'fiscal cliff' deal

NEW YORK: US stocks fell Wednesday amid uncertainty about whether a deal to avert the "fiscal cliff" could be reached by an end-of-year deadline.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 24.49 points (0.19 percent) to finish the session at 13,114.59.

The broad-market S&P 500 lost 6.83 points (0.48 percent) at 1,419.83, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite shed 22.44 points (0.74 percent) at 2,990.16.

"Investors in the US returned to business in the midst of the omnipresent tick-tick-ticking of the fiscal cliff clock," said analysts with Charles Schwab & Co.

The White House and Congress have until the end of the month to reach a compromise on how to avert a year-end crisis that could lead to stiff tax hikes and drastic budget cuts.

Experts say a dive over the so-called "fiscal cliff" could drive the world's biggest economy back into recession.

Obama was to head back to the capital late Wednesday from a shortened family Christmas break in Hawaii, and lawmakers are also expected back in Washington on Thursday.

Stocks in focus during the midweek session included those of online video giant Netflix, which gained 0.47 percent in the wake of an outage of its online film streaming service on Christmas Eve. On Wednesday, Netflix blamed Amazon for the incident, which rents out computing power in datacenters in the Internet "cloud." Amazon dropped 3.86 percent.

US commodities and derivatives market InterContinentalExchange (ICE) and its transatlantic peer NYSE Euronext were down 0.03 percent and up 0.09 percent respectively, after at least one shareholder complaint was filed to contest their planned fusion, announced last week.

Shares of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion meanwhile soared 11.5 percent, recovering after a plunge on Friday on investor fears that its new smartphone platform will thin the ranks paying for its service.

Tech heavyweight Apple meanwhile lost 1.4 percent.

Bond prices rose. The 10-year US Treasury yield fell to 1.76 percent from 1.77 percent late Monday, while the 30-year dipped to 2.93 percent from 2.94 percent. Bond prices and yields move inversely. Markets were closed Tuesday in observance of Christmas Day.

-AFP/ac

Read More..

Fiscal cliff deal likely within 10 days

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: House leaders say the Senate must act on House proposals first


• NEW: Secretary Geithner warns the government will reach the debt ceiling soon


• President Obama and senators are heading back to Washington


• The fiscal cliff deadline was created by Congress, which now seeks to avoid it

Washington (CNN) -- Sometime in the next 10 days, a fiscal cliff agreement is likely.

It almost certainly won't be the grand bargain sought by President Barack Obama and House Speaker John Boehner that addresses the nation's chronic federal deficits and debt.

It may not happen before January 1, the trigger date for the automatic tax increases on everyone and deep spending cuts of the fiscal cliff.

When it does occur, a deal will likely be similar to proposals rejected by Republicans during similar brinksmanship efforts of the past two years.

"It's all about scoring political points," GOP Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen complained Wednesday on CNN, referring to both sides in the debate. "I know the American people are tired of all of us."

Obama is heading back to Washington on Wednesday night from his Hawaiian vacation, leaving behind the first family, to be ready if the Senate comes up with a plan when it returns Thursday from its own Christmas break.

Fiscal cliff bill could come down to wire

Meanwhile, House Republican leaders held a conference call Wednesday afternoon but made no decision about when to bring their members back to Washington, according to a GOP source on the call. Members were told last week they would receive 48 hours' notice if they needed to return after Christmas.

The principal dispute continues to be over taxes, specifically the demand by Obama and Democrats to extend most of the tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush while allowing higher rates of the 1990s to return on top income brackets.

Obama campaigned for re-election on keeping the current lower tax rates on family income up to $250,000, which he argues would protect 98% of Americans and 97% of small businesses from rates that increase on income above that level.

Republicans oppose any kind of increase in tax rates, and Boehner suffered the political indignity last week of offering a compromise -- a $1 million threshold for the higher rates to kick in -- that his colleagues refused to support because it raised taxes and had no chance of passing the Democrat-controlled Senate.

Rep. Nan Hayworth, R-New York, acknowledged Wednesday that a deal will have to include some form of higher rates on top income brackets, but she said her party would fight to make it as minimal as possible.

Going over the cliff: What changes, what doesn't

"If that's where people have to go, we'll make the threshold as high as we can," Hayworth said on CNN, arguing that higher taxes in any form burden economic growth. "Because the more relief we provide, the better off we'll be."

Hayworth also made clear that a limited agreement was the most to expect for now, saying: "I don't think we're going to get the big plan in the next six days."

A statement Wednesday by Boehner's leadership team said the Democratic-controlled Senate must act first on proposals already passed by the House but rejected by Senate leaders and Obama.

"If the Senate will not approve and send them to the president to be signed into law in their current form, they must be amended and returned to the House," the leadership statement said. "Once this has occurred, the House will then consider whether to accept the bills as amended, or to send them back to the Senate with additional amendments. The House will take this action on whatever the Senate can pass, but the Senate first must act."

Obama and Democrats have leverage, based on the president's re-election last month and Democratic gains in the House and Senate in the new Congress that will convene in January. In addition, polls consistently show majority support for Obama's position on taxes.

Economists warn that failure to avoid the fiscal cliff could bring a recession, and stocks have been down since the middle of last week, when apparent progress in the talks suddenly unraveled with Boehner proposing his own "Plan B" that was rejected by fellow House Republicans.

The Gallup daily tracking poll released Wednesday showed 54% of respondents support Obama's handling of the fiscal cliff negotiations, compared with 26% who approve of Boehner's performance.

Starbucks makes political push on fiscal cliff

Sen. Harry Reid, the Democratic majority leader in the Senate, had an approval rating of 34% for his role so far.

Reid is poised to assume a larger role as the focus of negotiations appears to be shifting to the Senate after last week's GOP disarray in the House stymied any progress before Christmas.

A senior Senate Democratic source told CNN on Wednesday that Reid has made clear in private conversations that he will need assurance any plan can pass both the Senate and the House before he will bring it up.

"It is to nobody's advantage to have a failed Senate vote at this point," the source said on condition of not being identified. "This will be the last train we will have, and there is no sense in it leaving the station before we have assurance it will get through."

Remaining questions include whether enough Republicans will support a compromise acceptable to Democrats, and whether Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell will allow a simple majority vote to take up and pass any proposal, or stick to the filibuster level of 60%.

At the same time, some Senate Democrats have discussed holding off on bringing up a proposal until the final days of 2012 to increase pressure on Republicans to support avoiding higher taxes on everyone due to the fiscal cliff.

While the focus now is on a possible agreement in coming days or weeks, anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist told CNN earlier this week that the nation should gird for long-range battle.

"It's four years of a fight. It's not one week of a fight," said Norquist, who has threatened to mount primary challenges against Republicans who violate a pledge they signed at his behest against ever voting for a tax increase.

While both sides say they want to avoid the fiscal cliff, signs are emerging that a deal would come after the new year to blunt the harshest impacts.

Under that scenario, the new Congress convening in early January would vote to lower taxes from the higher rates that will go into effect in January when the Bush cuts expire, with the new top rates staying intact.

According to a senior administration official, Obama continues to oppose a Republican call for extending the Bush-era tax cuts for everyone to buy time for working out a broader deficit reduction deal that would include overall tax reform.

However, a Senate Republican leadership aide told CNN that Republicans reject Obama's $250,000 threshold for tax cut extensions.

"We're going to be here New Year's Eve," retiring Sen. Joe Lieberman said Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union," adding that it was likely the nation would go over the fiscal cliff.

Failing to meet the year-end deadline on striking a deal would amount to "the most colossal, consequential act of congressional irresponsibility in a long time," said Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut who caucuses with Democrats. "Maybe ever in American history, because of the impact it will have on almost every American."

However, Norquist called the situation part of a longer process, predicting "a regular fight" when Congress needs to authorize more government spending and raise the federal debt ceiling in coming months.

"There the Republicans have a lot of clout because they can say we'll let you run the government for the next month, but you've got to make these reforms," he explained.

On Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner informed Congress that the government would reach its borrowing limit at the end of the year -- in five days' time -- but could take steps to create what he called "headroom" for two months or so.

However, Geithner said uncertainty over the fiscal cliff negotiations and possible changes to the deficit situation made it difficult to predict precisely how long the government's steps to ease the situation would last.

Before heading to Hawaii last Friday, Obama called for Congress to come back after Christmas and work with him on a limited agreement to prevent tax hikes on the middle class, extend unemployment insurance and set a framework for future deficit reduction steps.

Boehner's spokesman said the speaker will be "ready to find a solution that can pass both houses of Congress" when he returns to Washington, expected to occur on Thursday.

The GOP opposition to any kind of tax rate increase has stalled deficit negotiations for two years and led to unusual political drama, such as McConnell recently filibustering a proposal he introduced and Thursday night's rebuff by House Republicans of the alternative tax plan pushed by Boehner, their leader.

Reid and other Senate Democrats say House Republicans must accept that agreement will require support from legislators in both parties, rather than a GOP majority in the House pushing through a measure on its own.

He insisted that a Senate-passed plan with Obama's $250,000 threshold would pass the House if Boehner would allow a vote. However, the Senate proposal is held up on constitutional grounds, because legislation that increases revenue must originate in the House.

Boehner and Republicans complain the Senate has refused to take up any proposals they have passed in the past two years. Reid argues that the GOP measures amount to a conservative wish list of unacceptable spending cuts and reforms intended to shrink government and weaken entitlement programs vital to senior citizens, the poor and the disabled.

Some House Republicans have said they would join Democrats in supporting the president's proposal in hopes of moving past the volatile issue to focus on the spending cuts and entitlement reforms they seek.

The possibility of a fiscal cliff was set in motion over the past two years as a way to force action on mounting government debt.

Now, legislators risk looking politically cynical by seeking to weaken the measures enacted to try to force them to confront tough questions regarding deficit reduction, such as reforms to popular entitlement programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

The two sides seemingly had made progress early last week on forging a $2 trillion deficit reduction deal that included new revenue sought by Obama and spending cuts and entitlement changes desired by Boehner.

Obama's latest offer set $400,000 as the income threshold for a tax rate increase, up from his original plan of $250,000. It also included a new formula for the consumer price index applied to some entitlement benefits, much to the chagrin of liberals.

Called chained CPI, the new formula includes assumptions on consumer habits in response to rising prices, such as seeking cheaper alternatives, and would result in smaller benefit increases in future years.

Statistics supplied by opponents say the change would mean Social Security recipients would get $6,000 less in benefits over the first 15 years of chained CPI.

Liberal groups sought to mount a pressure campaign against including the chained CPI after news emerged this week that Obama was willing to include it, calling the plan a betrayal of senior citizens who had contributed throughout their lives for their benefits.

For his part, Boehner conceded on increased tax revenue, including higher rates on top income brackets and eliminating some deductions and loopholes.

CNN's Brianna Keilar in Hawaii and Dana Bash, Kevin Bohn and Kevin Liptak in Washington contributed reporting to this story, which was written by Tom Cohen in Washington.

Read More..

Fmr. President Bush battling "stubborn" fever

A "stubborn" fever that kept former President George H.W. Bush in a hospital over Christmas has gotten worse, and doctors have put him on a liquids-only diet, his spokesman said Wednesday, describing Bush's condition as guarded to CBS News.

Jim McGrath, Bush's spokesman in Houston, had said earlier in the day that the fever had gone away, but he later corrected himself.

"It's an elevated fever, so it's actually gone up in the last day or two," McGrath told The Associated Press. "It's a stubborn fever that won't go away."

Doctors at Methodist Hospital in Houston have run tests and are treating the fever with Tylenol, but they still haven't nailed down a cause, McGrath said. Doctors also have put Bush on a liquid diet, though McGrath could not say why.

The bronchitis-like cough that initially brought Bush to the hospital on Nov. 23 has improved, McGrath said. The 88-year-old is now coughing about once a day, he said.

Bush was visited on Christmas by his wife, Barbara, his son, Neil, and Neil's wife, Maria, and a grandson, McGrath said. Bush's daughter, Dorothy, will arrive Wednesday in Houston from Bethesda, Md. The 41st president has also been visited twice by his sons, George W. Bush, the 43rd president, and Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida.

Bush and his wife live in Houston during the winter and spend their summers at a home in Kennebunkport, Maine.

The former president was a naval aviator in World War II - at one point the youngest in the Navy - and was shot down over the Pacific. He achieved notoriety in retirement for skydiving on at least three of his birthdays since leaving the White House in 1992.

Read More..

Gunman Killed Firemen With Bushmaster, Left Note

A convicted killer, who shot dead two firefighters with a Bushmaster assault rifle after leading them into an ambush when they responded to a house fire he set in Western New York, left behind a typewritten note saying he wanted to "do what I like doing best, killing people," police said.

William Spengler, 62, set his home and a car on fire early Monday morning with the intention of setting a trap to kill firefighters and to see "how much of the neighborhood I can burn down," according to the note he wrote and which police found at the scene. The note did not give a reason for his actions.

Spengler, who served 18 years in prison for beating his 92-year-old grandmother to death with a hammer in 1981, hid Monday morning in a small ditch beside a tree overlooking the sleepy lakeside street in Webster, N.Y., where he lived with his sister, police said today in a news conference.

Police said they found remains in the house, believed to be that of the sister, Cheryl Spengler, 67.

As firefighters arrived on the scene after a 5:30 a.m. 911 call on the morning of Christmas Eve, Spengler opened fire on them with the Bushmaster, the same semi-automatic, military-style weapon used in the Dec. 14 rampage killing of 20 children in Newtown, Conn.

"This was a clear ambush on first responders… Spengler had armed himself heavily and taken area of cover," said Gerald Pickering, the chief of the Webster Police Department.

Armed with a Smith & Wesson .38 caliber revolver, a Mossman 12-gauge shotgun, and the Bushmaster, Spengler killed two firefighters, and injured two more as well as an off-duty police officer at the scene.

As a convicted felon, Spengler could not legally own a firearm and police are investigating how he obtained the weapons.

One firefighter tried to take cover in his fire engine and was killed with a gunshot through the windshield, Pickering said.

Responding police engaged in a gunfight with Spengler, who ultimately died, likely by a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

As police engaged the gunman, more houses along Lake Ontario were engulfed, ultimately razing seven of them. Some 33 people in adjoining homes were displaced by the fire.

SWAT teams were forced to evacuate residents using armored vehicles.

Police identified the two slain firefighter as Lt. Michael Chiapperini, a 20-year veteran of the Webster Police Department and "lifetime firefighter," according to Pickering, and Tomasz Kaczowka, who also worked as a 911 dispatcher.

Two other firefighters were wounded and remain the intensive care unit at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, N.Y.

Joseph Hofsetter was shot once. He sustained an injury to his pelvis and has "a long road to recovery," said Dr. Nicole A. Stassen, a trauma physician.

The second firefighter, Theodore Scardino, was shot twice and received injuries to his left shoulder and left lung, as well as a knee.

Read More..

New Scientist 2012 holiday quiz

Continue reading page

|1

|2

THIS was the year we held our breath in almost unbearable anticipation while we waited to see whether physicists at the Large Hadron Collider would finally get a clear view of the Higgs boson, so tantalisingly hinted at last December. Going a bit blue, we held on through March when one of the LHC's detectors seemed to lose sight of the thing, before exhaling in a puff of almost-resolution in July, when researchers announced that the data added up to a fairly confident pretty-much-actual-discovery of the particle.

Early indications were that it might be a weird and wonderful variety of the Higgs, prompting a collective gasp of excitement. That was followed by a synchronised sigh of mild disappointment when later data implied that it was probably the most boring possible version after all, and not a strange entity pointing the way to new dimensions and the true nature of dark matter. Prepare yourself for another puff or two as the big story moves on next year.

This respirational rollercoaster might be running a bit too slowly to supply enough oxygen to the brain of a New Scientist reader, so we have taken care to provide more frequent oohs and aahs using less momentous revelations. See how many of the following unfundamental discoveries you can distinguish from the truth-free mimics that crowd parasitically around them.

1. Which of these anatomical incongruities of the animal kingdom did we describe on 14 July?

• a) A fish, found in a canal in Vietnam, that wears its genitals under its mouth
• b) A frog, found in a puddle in Peru, that has no spleen
• c) A lizard, found in a cave in Indonesia, that has four left feet
• d) A cat, found in a tree in northern England, that has eight extra teeth

2. "A sprout by any other name would taste as foul." So wrote William Shakespeare in his diary on 25 December 1598, setting off the centuries of slightly unjust ridicule experienced by this routinely over-cooked vegetable. But which forbiddingly named veg did we report on 7 July as having more health-giving power than the sprout, its active ingredient being trialled as a treatment for prostate cancer?

• a) Poison celery
• b) Murder beans
• c) Inconvenience potatoes
• d) Death carrots

3. Scientists often like to say they are opening a new window on things. Usually that is a metaphor, but on 10 November we reported on a more literal innovation in the fenestral realm. It was:

• a) A perspex peephole set in the nest of the fearsome Japanese giant hornet, to reveal its domestic habits
• b) A glass porthole implanted in the abdomen of a mouse, to reveal the process of tumour metastasis
• c) A crystal portal in the inner vessel of an experimental thorium reactor, to reveal its nuclear fires to the naked eye
• d) A small window high on the wall of a basement office in the Princeton physics department, to reveal a small patch of sky to postgraduate students who have not been outside for seven years

4. On 10 March we described a new material for violin strings, said to produce a brilliant and complex sound richer than that of catgut. What makes up these super strings?

• a) Mousegut
• b) Spider silk
• c) Braided carbon nanotubes
• d) An alloy of yttrium and ytterbium

5. While the peril of climate change looms inexorably larger, in this festive-for-some season we might take a minute to look on the bright side. On 17 March we reported on one benefit of global warming, which might make life better for some people for a while. It was:

• a) Receding Arctic sea ice will make it easier to lay undersea cables to boost internet speeds
• b) Increasing temperatures mean that Greenlanders can soon start making their own wine
• c) Rising sea levels could allow a string of new beach resorts to open in the impoverished country of Chad
• d) More acidic seawater will add a pleasant tang to the salt water taffy sweets made in Atlantic City

6. In Alaska's Glacier Bay national park, the brown bear in the photo (above, right) is doing something never before witnessed among bearkind, as we revealed on 10 March. Is it:

• a) Making a phonecall?
• b) Gnawing at a piece of whalebone to dislodge a rotten tooth?
• c) Scratching itself with a barnacle-covered stone tool?
• d) Cracking oysters on its jaw?

7. Men have much in common with fruit flies, as we revealed on 24 March. When the sexual advances of a male fruit fly are rejected, he may respond by:

• a) Whining
• b) Hitting the booze
• c) Jumping off a tall building
• d) Hovering around the choosy female long after all hope is lost

8. While great Higgsian things were happening at the LHC, scientists puzzled over a newly urgent question: what should we call the boson? Peter Higgs wasn't the only physicist to predict its existence, and some have suggested that the particle's name should also include those other theorists or perhaps reflect some other aspect of the particle. Which of the following is a real suggestion that we reported on 24 March?

Continue reading page

|1

|2

If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.

All comments should respect the New Scientist House Rules. If you think a particular comment breaks these rules then please use the "Report" link in that comment to report it to us.

If you are having a technical problem posting a comment, please contact technical support.

Read More..

Hawkish Abe to be named Japan's next prime minister

TOKYO: Japan's conservative leader Shinzo Abe is to be named as the country's new prime minister Wednesday, after he swept to power on a hawkish platform of getting tough on diplomacy while fixing the economy.

The powerful lower house will name the 58-year-old as leader in an extraordinary session Wednesday afternoon, following a resounding national election victory for his Liberal Democratic Party earlier this month.

As Japan's seventh premier in less than seven years, Abe will replace outgoing Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda whose Democratic Party of Japan suffered a stinging defeat at the polls.

The party, which came to power in 2009, was seen as being punished for policy flip-flops and its clumsy handling of last year's atomic disaster at Fukushima.

Noda's cabinet is to resign en masse Wednesday morning before the LDP-controlled lower house names Abe as Japan's leader.

Abe, who previously served as prime minister from 2006 to 2007, is expected to form a new cabinet later in the day as he rushes to draft an extra budget to spur the nation's flagging economy.

Japanese media have suggested Abe was likely to tap close associates and senior party members for key posts.

Taro Aso, another former prime minister in Japan's revolving-door political system, was widely expected to be named as both Abe's deputy and also finance minister, the reports said.

Japan's new foreign minister was likely to be Fumio Kishida, 55, who served as a state minister in charge of Okinawan affairs under Abe's previous tenure.

The expected appointment was seen as a reflection of Abe's desire for progress on the relocation of US military bases in the southern island chain.

Sadakazu Tanigaki, the head of the LDP when the party was in opposition after ruling Japan for most of the past six decades, is tipped to become the country's justice minister, the reports said.

Abe won conservative support with nationalistic pronouncements on diplomacy in the midst of a territorial row with Beijing over a group of East China Sea islands, saying Japan would stand firm on its claim to the chain.

But he quickly toned down the campaign rhetoric and has said he wants improved ties with China, Japan's biggest trading partner.

Abe called for a solution through what he described as "patient exchanges".

The new leader, whose key campaign platform was reviving the world's third-largest economy, has also said he would look at revising Japan's post-war pacifist constitution, alarming officials in China and South Korea.

He vowed to pressure the Bank of Japan for further easing measures to boost growth, while also promising big government spending to spur the economy.

Analysts said Abe was likely to hold off drastic policy measures ahead of upper house elections next year, while the LDP's moderate junior coalition partner New Komeito could balance his right-leaning instincts.

-AFP/ac

Read More..

Top celebs

updated 9:20 AM EST, Thu December 20, 2012

CNN readers' favorites: Celebrity women

No. 10: Sandra Bullock

No. 9: Angelina Jolie

No. 8: Katy Perry

No. 7: Taylor Swift

No. 6: Sofia Vergara

No. 5: Carrie Underwood

No. 4: Jennifer Lawrence

No. 3: Jennifer Aniston

No. 2: Adele

No. 1: Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge

CNN readers' favorites: Celebrity men

No. 10: Justin Timberlake

No. 9: Jeremy Renner

No. 8: Brad Pitt

No. 7: Ryan Gosling

No. 6: Adam Levine

No. 5: Joseph Gordon-Levitt

No. 4: Ben Affleck

No. 3: Channing Tatum

No. 2: Johnny Depp

No. 1: Daniel Craig

<<

<

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

>

>>

Read More..

Messy Christmas weather turns dangerous

Updated 4:59 p.m. EST

NEW ORLEANS Freezing rain and sleet made for a sloppy Christmas trek in parts of the nation's midsection, while residents along the Gulf Coast faced thunderstorms, high winds and tornadoes that were doing damage in some areas.

Winds toppled a tree onto a pickup truck in the Houston area, killing the driver. Icy roads already were blamed for a 21-vehicle pileup in Oklahoma, where authorities warned would-be travelers to stay home.

Trees fell on a few houses in central Louisiana's Rapides Parish but there were no injuries reported so far and crews were cutting trees out of roadways to get to people in their homes, said sheriff's Lt. Tommy Carnline. Possible damage also was reported near McNeil, Miss.

Fog blanketed highways, including arteries in the Atlanta area where motorists slowed as a precaution. In New Mexico, drivers across the eastern plains had to fight through snow, ice and low visibility.

At least three tornadoes were reported in Texas, though only one building was damaged, according to the National Weather Service. Tornado watches were in effect across southern Louisiana and Mississippi.

More than 180 flights nationwide were canceled by midday, according to the flight tracker FlightAware.com. More than half were canceled by American Airlines and its regional affiliate, American Eagle.

American is headquartered and has its biggest hub at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

Christmas lights also were knocked out with more than 70,000 people without power in east Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi and Louisiana.

Meanwhile, blizzard conditions were possible for parts of Illinois, Indiana and western Kentucky with predictions of 4 to 7 inches of snow. Much of Oklahoma and Arkansas braced under a winter storm warning of an early mix of rain and sleet forecast to eventually turn to snow. About a dozen counties in Missouri were under a blizzard warning from Tuesday night to noon Wednesday.

Some mountainous areas of Arkansas' Ozark Mountains could get up to 10 inches of snow, which would make travel "very hazardous or impossible" in the northern tier of the state from near whiteout conditions, the National Weather Service said.

The holiday may conjure visions of snow and ice, but twisters this time of year are not unheard of. Ten storm systems in the last 50 years have spawned at least one Christmastime tornado with winds of 113 mph or more in the South, said Chris Vaccaro, a National Weather Service spokesman in Washington, via email.

The most lethal were the storms of Dec. 24-26, 1982, when 29 tornadoes in Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and Mississippi killed three people and injured 32; and those of Dec. 24-25, 1964, when two people were killed and about 30 people injured by 14 tornadoes in seven states.

Quarter-sized hail reported early Tuesday in western Louisiana was expected to be just the start of a severe weather threat on the Gulf Coast, said meteorologist Mike Efferson at the weather service office in Slidell, La.

Storms along the Gulf Coast could bring winds up to 70 mph, heavy rain, more large hail and dangerous lightning in Louisiana and Mississippi, Efferson said. Furthermore, warm, moist air colliding with a cold front could produce dangerous straight-line winds.

The storm was moving quickly as it headed into northeast Louisiana and Mississippi into the late afternoon and early evening, said Bill Adams at the weather service's Shreveport, La., office.

In Mississippi, Gov. Phil Bryant urged residents to have a plan for any severe weather.

"It only takes a few minutes, and it will help everyone have a safe Christmas," Bryant said.

Read More..

4 Firefighters Shot, 2 Killed in NY 'Trap'

A man who served nearly 17 years in jail for killing his grandmother set a house and car on fire this morning in upstate New York and then began shooting at emergency personnel who showed up, killing two firefighters, police said.

In all, William Spengler, 62, shot four firefighters, killing two and severely injuring two more after setting his "trap," police said.

An off-duty police officer from Greece, N.Y., who responded to the scene early in the morning of Christmas Eve also was injured today.

"It was a trap," said Webster, N.Y., Police Chief Gerald L. Pickering, "set by Mr. Spengler who laid in wait and shot first responders."

Spengler, who was released from prison in 1998, was found dead at the scene following a shootout with police. He was believed to have killed himself with a bullet to the head.

As a convicted felon, Spengler would not have been allowed to own guns legally. Police were working to determine the types of weapons he used and how he obtained them, Pickering said.

Spengler was convicted of manslaughter in 1981 for "beating his 92-year-old grandmother with a hammer," according to state prison documents.

Several weapons were used, Pickering said, and, "probably a rifle was used to inflict wounds of the first responders.

"I know many people are going to be asking if they were assault rifles," Pickering said

There has been a week-long national debate about such weapons after one was used in a tragic school shooting in Newtown, Conn. on Dec. 14.

Four firefighters, two on a ladder truck and two more in their own vehicles, responded to 911 calls around 5:30 a.m. Monday morning. Spengler is believed to have hidden behind an elevated berm, shooting down on the firefighters and later police.

"Upon arrival, all [the firefighters] drew fire. All four were shot on the scene," Pickering said. "One was able to flee the scene. The other three were pinned down."

Police believe Spengler's sister may have been inside the home, and that he set it on fire.

The blaze spread, engulfing three nearby homes and damaging three more on a sleepy street next to Lake Ontario that police described as a quiet vacation community. The fire was not put under control until late this afternoon.

SWAT team officers used an armored personnel carrier to evacuate 33 residents from homes in the area.

Among the dead firefighters was Lt. Michael Chiapperini, a 20-year veteran of the Webster Police Department and "lifetime firefighter," according to Pickering. Chiapperini was a spokesman for the police department, ABC News affiliate WHAM reported.

Police identified the other firefighter killed as Tomasz Kaczowka, who also worked as a 911 dispatcher.

The chief, choking up, called the incident that shattered the quiet before 6 a.m. on Christmas Eve morning "terrible."

"People get up in the middle of the night to fight fires," he said. "They don't expect to get shot and killed."

Two surviving firefighters were in the intensive care unit at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, N.Y. Both men were awake and breathing on their own after surgery and were in what doctors are calling "guarded condition."

Joseph Hofsetter was shot once. He sustained an injury to his pelvis and has "a long road to recovery," said Dr. Nicole A. Stassen, a trauma physician.

The second firefighter, Theodore Scardino, was shot twice and received injuries to his left shoulder and left lung, as well as a knee.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo released a statement calling the attack a "senseless act of violence" and the first responders "true heroes."

Read More..